Book Review: Becoming God’s Family by Carmen Joy Imes
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Carmen Joy Imes, Becoming God’s Family: Why the Church Still Matters. IVP, 2025. 256 pp.
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“Why does the church still matter?” It’s a question many ask—those who have drifted from Sunday worship, who carry wounds from broken communities, or who wonder whether belonging is worth the trouble. In Becoming God’s Family: Why the Church Still Matters, Dr. Carmen Joy Imes invites readers to rediscover the beauty of life together as God’s people.
Imes, a biblical scholar best known for Bearing God’s Name and Being God’s Image, brings together careful exegesis and pastoral warmth to help modern readers recover a biblical vision of belonging. With tenderness and conviction, she weaves a story from Abraham’s family to the body of Christ, reminding us that following Jesus means being joined to his people. For Anglicans seeking to renew parish life and discipleship, this book offers both encouragement and challenge.
Tracing God’s Family Through Scripture
Imes shows that belonging to God has always meant belonging to his people. She begins with the covenant identity of the people of God and follows that thread into the New Testament, where Jesus redefines family around himself. God’s call has never been about personal achievement or private faith—it has always been a communal call to live under God’s rule and care. As Imes writes, “God’s promises are not aimed at helping us reach our personal goals. Instead, God’s promises transcend our personal lives and stretch wide to encompass others we will never even meet.”
The heart of the book explores why the local church still matters for Christian identity and discipleship, concluding with practical steps for living out that calling together. While she does not ignore the pain and disillusionment many have experienced in the church, Imes faces those realities honestly, both in Scripture and in modern congregations.
God Will Unite His Family
Yet Imes’s conclusion is filled with hope: God will ultimately succeed in uniting his family. She shows with warmth and clarity that this has been God’s purpose from the very beginning—to create a people who live together under his love and bring his kingdom to earth. “By receiving God’s sacrificial love for us and by expressing that love to one another,” she writes, “we participate in God’s one and only plan to restore creation and fulfill his covenant promises. Above all, the Spirit of God is present among us as we are united in Christ to one another.”
Blending biblical theology, pastoral reflection, and practical exhortation, Imes has written a book that is accessible to all readers, offering both depth for the theologically minded and encouragement for those longing to rediscover the beauty of belonging to God’s family.
It is here that her work begins to intersect meaningfully with Anglican life and worship.
The Church as God’s Embodied Family
One of Carmen Imes’s greatest strengths lies in her understanding of the Old Testament and the clarity with which she traces the intricate threads of God’s design for his family throughout Scripture. Her pastoral warmth makes this book especially inviting for lay readers. While Anglicans might at times wish for a fuller expression of sacramental theology or a clearer engagement with global ecclesial challenges, Imes’s insistence on the visible, embodied nature of the church bridges many of these gaps. Within her broad evangelical context, she offers a vision that will resonate deeply with Anglicans.
Imes excels in showing that inclusion has always been at the heart of God’s family. She highlights how each book of the Old Testament reveals God’s desire to bring people of every nation and tongue into his covenant community. Egypt, Moab, the Hittites, and others are woven into the fabric of God’s story, even shaping the lineage of Jesus himself. She also draws attention to the mutual service of men and women in the early church, noting how Paul’s ministry was strengthened by faithful female co-laborers.
Anglicans and God’s Expansive Family
Anglicans can see clear parallels here: the growth of the Anglican Communion in the Global South and the expanding ministry of women reflect the same expansive vision of God’s family. The Anglican “middle way” provides space for diverse expression while remaining anchored in Scripture, and Imes achieves something similar in her portrayal of Jesus forming a new family of faith. Her vision echoes the Book of Common Prayer’s emphasis on incorporation and inclusion within the body of Christ.
Imes also makes a compelling case for embodied worship, returning again and again to the importance of gathering with those alongside whom we worship. As someone new to Anglicanism, I resonated deeply with her call to an embodied life in community, beautifully pictured in the sacramental rhythm of the Daily Office, the weekly Eucharist, and parish belonging. Her reflections reminded me of the formative power of kneeling together, praying together, and speaking words of faith as one body. Her book encouraged me to enter more deeply into parish life and to invite others to do the same.
Practicing Belonging in Parish Life
Imes’s vision of God’s family is particularly relevant for Anglicans amid tension and renewal across our Communion. Becoming God’s Family reminds us that fidelity to Scripture is never only a matter of belief—it is also a matter of belonging. To live faithfully before God means to live faithfully with one another.
Her call to embodied community invites us to practice reconciliation and unity rooted in truth and covenant faithfulness—the same covenant love that binds God’s people together throughout Scripture. Across provinces, we are joined by one baptism and one Lord, called to embody covenant faithfulness not only in doctrine but also in love. Healing in our global Communion begins in local parishes, where we listen across differences, pray for one another, and gather around the Lord’s Table as members of the same household of faith.
Pastors and lay leaders may find in Imes’s book a gentle but timely resource for renewing commitment to the local church, teaching on community, and nurturing a deeper sense of belonging grounded in Scripture and sustained by grace.
A Book for the Whole Family of God
In a cultural moment when many are questioning whether the church is relevant—or even safe—Dr. Imes reminds us that God’s plan for forming his people has always been communal. Becoming God’s Family is a clear, Scripture-rich invitation to reimagine the church not as an optional add-on, but as the very place that shapes us into Christ’s likeness.
For Anglicans, this vision resonates deeply with our tradition’s emphasis on worship, sacraments, and shared life in the parish. Imes’s call to embodied community echoes the heart of Anglican spirituality: Christ does not save us into isolation, but into a people who pray, serve, and grow together. Whether you are a pastor seeking to encourage your congregation, a layperson longing for deeper connection, or someone uncertain about the church’s place in your life, this book offers hope.
Imes helps us see the church once again as a beautiful gift—the living family of God through whom Christ continues his work of redemption in the world.
Image: Becoming God’s Family © 2025 IVP.
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